Our town’s by-pass again: a clear evening, the hills in crisp view. Acres of oil seed rape are waiting to be harvested. Wimbledon is over again. The darker side of me thinks I might as well start writing my Christmas cards. Every Lent I love the time of the Cheltenham Festival, in March, with Spring and Summer to come, and the days to get lighter and longer. As I stood by the roadside tonight a lone estate car drove by, pulling a trailer piled with bales of straw. I think it must have been oil seed straw. Very soon the tractors will be harvesting our fields here. The year is moving on. Marking time. My hope is in ‘the still point of the turning world’.

Thanks CM. Yes the seasonal waymarks, from the Cheltenham Races and the Boat Race, via Wimbledon, Henley and the cricket Tests to the end of the Prom season at the Albert Hall.I do wish that football (soccer) would not muscle in so much on the season of our summer game though.